Virtual life

 

Lately a colleague of mine mentioned the subject of virtual life and how the pandemic is affecting it.

 

The way I look at things, the origins of virtual life as experienced today came many centuries, even millenia, ago, when the human race started passing messages from one person to another when these were too far away to be seen or heard.  I’m referring to the means of communication, initially through writing or signals, then with the development of telecommunications such as the telex, phone, fax, radio and others.

 

In this way, individuals, communities or groups could communicate and take actions based on these communications, even if physically they did not meet, with the same outcome as if they did.  I’m talking about developments in personal relationships, commerce, the dissemination of information and the like.

 

With development of the computer, the internet, optical fibres, satellites, cellular telephone, this trend just continued growing.  Today, you don’t just call your mate from your home phone, but also see him or her almost anywhere on earth, at a price that always gets closer to zero.

 

Even before COVID struck, you could meet your mates through writing (email, chat rooms) or audio visual means instead of physically going somewhere.  One can also select a representative called an avatar and move it in a completely fictitious social life that only exists on computer.

 

You can meet virtually with family, friends, people with common interests, and discuss or follow comments that are being made, or play games.

 

You can search for a life partner with the multitude of websites and apps that exist for this purpose, some general purpose and others specific for certain characteristics (such as religion, sexual orientation, age, interests etc).

 

You could carry out courses of any type, including university level, without moving your butt from your favourite chair.

 

These are all important facilities, as they facilitate access to useful services for many, many people, provided, that is, you have the money to buy the technology necessary and be in a location having an adequate communication network.

 

This was all in place prior to COVID.  What has happened now is that with the measures taken by governments the world over to limit the virus spread, especially with economy lockdowns, stay-at-home orders as much as possible and other movement restrictions on regional, state and international levels, the facilities that one might have heard about became not only useful but essential.

 

Now that things have started to get a bit easier with the increase of people vaccinated against COVID, one might perhaps expect that the use of virtual tools might reduce back to what they were prior to the pandemic.  I have my doubts whether this will in fact occur.

 

Just take as an example the use of technology by children, especially the younger ones.  For a long time, it was recommended for young children not to have screen time, including television, tablet or smartphone, in excess of an hour every day.1  Now during the school lockdown, my five-year-old kids were pushed to stay in front of the computer to follow their school lessons for about four hours every day, apart from other home work they needed to do.  Now am I suddenly about to convince them that they cannot have more than one hour screen time as it is not good for their health?

 

Many enterprises were requested to let their employees work from home if possible.  This wasn’t a practice that just started now, but suddenly many more employees started making use of this activity.  When this storm is over, don’t you think some organisations will realise they can do without investing in centralised office space costing an arm and a leg, and that many employees like the idea of avoiding spending hours in buses and trains?

 

The main problem with virtual life is the lack of physical and personal contact that you can only get from being close or in front of another person.  In front of a screen, or on the phone, one can act differently from being face-to-face with another.  I’ve often heard of people finding it easier to say negative things about or to a person when using technology rather than being in front of the person.

 

When in front of someone, one can observe better his or her reaction to what is being said or happening, things that could be lost if the camera is not in focus, or part of the face is not visible, or the voice drops out.

 

Virtual life has its limits.  It’s good we take advantage of it, but essential nevertheless to live a full life in the flesh - a physical life.

 

1https://www1.health.gov.au/internet/publications/publishing.nsf/Content/gug-indig-hb~inactivitiy, retrieved 6/10/2021

Money is not the problem

 

I think many of you know about the surprise decision by the Autralian government in mid September 2021 to join the United States and United Kingdom in a pact called AUKUS for eight submarines to be built for Australia with propulsion coming from nuclear fission, some time between 2030 and 2040.

 

It was surprising for many reasons.  The first that comes to mind is that Australia is a country that for civil purposes does not use nuclear energy for electricity production but for nuclear medicine,1 and until yesterday had no military use for it.  The government declared that the use of nuclear technology will not extend to armaments.2

 

The second is that Australia already had a contract with a French company, Naval Group, to build twelve new submarines.  These were to work with diesel and electricity, and the basis for their design was actually a nuclear submarine, modified to change its propulsion from nuclear energy to diesel.  This contract had been thought to be worth $90 billion, from which $2 billion had already been spent.3

 

Naturally this was a slap in the face for the French state, which was determined to maintain a significant role in the Pacific, and the Australian contract was an important part of their strategy.  It was well known there were serious problems with the French project, with delays and an increase in costs, so much so that it was known the Australian government was looking at what alternatives there were for the Australian submarines.

 

Nevertheless it seems clear that these alternative considerations were made with great secrecy, and the French side were as surprised as the rest of the world with the step taken.

 

I do understand the advantages of a nuclear submarine, being able to remain permanently under the sea surface, on one that is powered by diesel, which has to resurface after some time to take on diesel and oxygen to be able to operate.  I also understand the fears of people about energy from nuclear fission, whose waste products can be used to build nuclear weapons.

 

What I wanted to comment here was about the expenditure, and the hypocrisy of our leaders that it demonstrates.

 

Consider now that the government has decided that instead of simply adopting the French nuclear submarine, adopt the American one, before even knowing how much this will cost.  It is thought that this new project will cost much more than the $90 billion of the French project.4

 

It is estimated that the Australian government will have to pay hundreds of millions of Australian dollars to the French Naval Group for tearing up the original contract.

 

Some time ago, the Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce declared he would not accept to increase the ambition of the country to combat climate change before knowing how much this would cost.5  Has Joyce accepted the AUKUS submarines without knowing the (astronimical) price?

When the government declares that something cannot be done because there is no money, it wasn’t planned, the price is too high or some variation thereof, the truth is that the subject is not a priority.  Period.

 

Take the Centrelink program, labelled Robodebt by its critics, which was trying to recover a few thousands of dollars apiece from those on social benefits, who had allegedly been overpaid.  Some time ago, this program was terminated hastily, after creating so much heartache amongst those who had unjustly been accused, and after many months of criticism.

 

Then consider the Jobkeeper benefit that was paid out until March 2021 as an assistance to organisations that estimated they were going to be worse off, to maintain the employment of hundreds of thousands of workers affected by COVID restrictions.  Lately, it was estimated that $13 billion were given to companies that in fact had not reduced their revenue during the pandemic, yet the government will not ask for the money back.6  Thirteen billion dollars!

 

On the other hand, the government agency Centrelink is attempting to recover $32 million from 11000 individuals, being overpayments related to the pandemic.7

 

Strong with the weak and weak with the strong.

 

1https://www.ansto.gov.au/about/what-we-do/at-ansto, retrieved 21/9/2021

2https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-09-16/australia-nuclear-submarine-partnership-us-uk/100465814, retrieved 21/9/2021.

3https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-06-02/defence-contingency-planning-french-submarine-program-germans/100184644, retrieved 21/9/2021

4https://thenewdaily.com.au/news/politics/australian-politics/2021/09/17/aukus-nuclear-submarines-cost/, retrieved 21/9/2021

5https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/we-ve-been-sucked-into-this-before-barnaby-joyce-won-t-back-climate-action-before-seeing-the-cost-20210810-p58hm3.html, retrieved 21/9/2021

6https://www.afr.com/policy/economy/jobkeeper-largesse-tops-13b-20210828-p58mqm, retrieved 21/9/2021

7https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-08-16/welfare-pandemic-covid-centrelink-debts-jobkeeper/100379072, retrieved 21/9/2021